Accelerometers are being incorporated into an ever expanding variety of electronic systems. For example, MEMS (MicroElectroMechanical Systems) accelerometers now are commonly used in automotive systems and in consumer and industrial electronics.
After fabricating a MEMS accelerometer, a calibration process typically is performed in the factory to determine trim adjustment values for each accelerometer sensing axis. The trim adjustment values may then be stored in a memory of a device within which the accelerometer ultimately is incorporated.
Conventional methods of calibrating accelerometers tend either to use expensive device handling and calibration equipment, or to perform the calibrations with low levels of automation and/or parallelism (e.g., only a single device or a small number of devices are calibrated simultaneously). High equipment expense and/or deficiencies in automation and/or parallelism detrimentally impact accelerometer manufacturing costs. Accelerometer manufacturers are forced to absorb the costs by offering products at lower margins and/or by including the relatively high manufacturing costs in their product pricing, potentially making their products less competitive in the marketplace.